


Healing Hands

by helo572



Category: Overwatch (Video Game)
Genre: Additional Warnings Apply, Additional Warnings In Author's Note, Developing Relationship, F/F, Pre-Fall of Overwatch
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2018-08-25
Updated: 2018-08-25
Packaged: 2019-07-02 05:05:16
Rating: Explicit
Warnings: Graphic Depictions Of Violence
Chapters: 1
Words: 3,254
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/15789531
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/helo572/pseuds/helo572
Summary: The first time Moira watches Angela die, she hasn’t the faintest clue of who she is. Simply her name, her callsign: MERCY (Ziegler, MD).





	Healing Hands

**Author's Note:**

> PLEASE HEED THE FOLLOWING WARNINGS BEFORE READING: this fic depicts scenes that may be triggering to readers, with discussion and depiction of suicide, graphic violence, body horror and human experimentation. If you do not feel safe to read such topics, please don't continue!
> 
> if you are choosing to continue, welcome to my take on [2018's Moicy Week](https://moicydiscord.tumblr.com/post/176425770360/hey-everyone-the-moicy-discord-proudly-announces)! this fic fills the prompt of mortality / immortality and explores angela and moira's relationship throughout overwatch and the rise of talon. i hope you enjoy <3
> 
> much love goes to the gorgeous [tig](http://hackedtig.tumblr.com/) for proof reading.

The first time Moira watches Angela die, she hasn’t the faintest clue of who she is. Simply her name, her callsign: MERCY (Ziegler, MD). Writhing beneath her fingertips from a shrapnel wound, blood spouting from her open neck in the rhythm of her heart:  _ ba-boom, ba-boom, ba-boom _ .

 

“Right external jugular is severed,” Moira announces, professional and detached, while still applying pressure with the rags she has fished from her kit. “Internal right jugular is ruptured. Chances are survival are very slim, we should--”

 

The Commander is surveying the trek before them, the elephant-sized crater in the once-defined jungle path, the three other soldiers wounded. He looks tired when he looks back at Moira, yet not the slightest bit harrowed, and that cuts her clean off. Moira doesn’t even remember  _ his _ name; the units had been hastily re-assigned by intelligence from the Front, and here they were in the Jungle in Cambodia.

 

Audibly, he watches the steady blood flow from Moira’s patient’s neck, to Moira’s now-soiled clothes, her steady hands. Then, he asks, “Anything you can do for the others?” A nod towards the crater, where one man is screaming, only screaming. He is missing his entire right leg, and some of his left leg, and his right hand. The other is blissfully still, yet his head is swollen a deep purple, his eyes, his jaw, his neck.

 

Moira shakes her head, while adjusting the rags she has pressed to the hole in her patient’s neck. She notices, with interest, that her eyes are open -- they always have been -- but they beg some part of intelligence when they settle on Moira.  _ Actually _ focus on her, two for two.

 

“A shame,” sighs the Commander.

 

“It’s alright.” Moira’s bedside manner is terrible, part of shining towards field medicine, and it shows when her patient scowls.  _ Scowls _ . With half of her neck missing, her blood pooling red into Moira’s Overwatch-branded skirts.

 

The Commander goes on, hinged on her words, in his own world, “Not really. See, I knew this was a doomed op when I took it. The Front’s been lost for ages, everybody knows it, just the Brass fighting for their bloody selves now.” He scoffs, and Moira does too, trying to ascertain  _ how _ this woman is still alive,  _ why _ she hasn’t just  _ given up _ . “Maybe they always have been.”

 

There’s an explosion from somewhere, far away, and it has them all pause to listen -- to reflect. Moira knew this was lost, too. The op, the Front, maybe even the whole goddamn war. And her  _ patient _ , with a severed jugular, still staring defiantly back up at her from the ground.

 

Her patient --  _ Mercy _ . Her lips slowly form,  _ Jugular _ .

 

“I wouldn’t try to speak,” Moira advises, but she knows that professionalism is slipping, replaced by -- by something. Something fierce. This woman is  _ fighting _ . “Your jugular is--”

 

Her lips finish,  _ Severed. _

 

Moira blinks. “Yes. The extent of the damage is severe, but--”

 

_ It’s okay. _

 

“The very opposite, but I’m glad one of us is fooled,” she chuckles, she has to, else her piqued curiosity is going to get the better of her. “You should lie back. Rest. I am doing all I can.”

 

Mercy smiles, and like Moira’s knowledge of medicine says she should, says nothing else. The sudden isolation -- tenfold when her eyes slowly slide closed again -- is jarring. It had only been three minutes since the bomb had gone off. Three minutes since she ever looked  _ sideways _ at this woman, yet here she was, dying in her arms. 

 

And so Moira watches, a silent vigil.

 

* * *

 

 

The second time Moira watches Angela die, is arguable, sitting in the fourth row at her funeral. It’s attended by the Brass, shared with another one hundred and twelve dead soldiers from the Front, and the surreality of it hits Moira by the third speech about Jackson Long, who died protecting his country from the Omnic threat.

 

She is attending her patient’s funeral, knowing nothing but how she died, not even her name or if she was survived by any attendees.

 

_ Dr Angela Ziegler _ is the forty-second name on the list, and with the silence that follows, Moira almost climbs to her feet to deliver something,  _ anything _ .  _ Ba-boom _ , and the silence is not empty, but full of mourning, and Moira instead bows her head to join in. 

 

For Angela.

 

* * *

 

 

The third time Moira watches Angela die, is completely contestable, because she spots Moira in a walkway between the East and West Wing. Two weeks after the funeral, for the casualties in Cambodia.

 

“ _ You _ ,” is all Angela says, which is when Moira looks up to see that dead face staring at her, bewildered. 

 

The look is returned tenfold. “You.”

 

Angela starts forward, “You saved me--” and this is the same time Moira’s brain catches up with what her eyes are seeing, “You  _ died _ \--” They stop almost nose-to-nose, tucked up against the wall, next to a sign in orange and white.

 

_ Ba-boom _ ,  _ ba-boom, _ silence. Moira notes with great interest the nearly-healed scarring on Angela’s neck, the shell-shocked look on her face.

 

“I watched you die,” Moira says, breathless, but to affirm it all. “You  _ did _ die. You bled out. You ruptured your superior cena vana, there’s no possible way for you to have survived.”

 

Angela looks trapped, all of a sudden. Between the wall and Moira, between the questions and the answers, between the fact and -- fiction? Her eyes wander Moira’s face, then downwards, to where her brand new skirts hang, no longer red but simply white.

 

“I went to your  _ funeral _ .”

 

“I-- I did attend the funeral, yes,” says Angela. “Not in a casket like the others. But--” She still looks like a trapped animal, skittish, and ready to flee. Moira lets herself wonder if this physically means Angela  _ fleeing _ , or Moira losing her memory -- or her life -- for the sake of whatever conspiracy she had stumbled into between the East and West Wing. “But I -- I can explain.  _ Will  _ explain.” She meets Moira’s eyes now, and her gaze is changed; now impressively determined. Rebellious. The body language changes with it; the skittish animal dies, and Moira lets out the breath she had been holding. “If you would like to know.”

 

“There’s no  _ if _ ,” she answers, callous, holding that gaze with her jaw set firm. “You  _ died _ ,” she states again, punctuating with her fingers against the wall, “right in front of me.”

 

“Okay,” Angela sighs, “okay. But I need to meet with--” She stops herself, and Moira watches the internal toss up Angela does between telling her or not telling her, and Moira only arches an eyebrow. “--with the Board.  _ But _ if you come by my lab at oh-fourteen-hundred today, I promise, I have answers.” They were impossibly close already, almost enough for Moira to taste the  _ newly resurrected _ on her, but Angela leans closer to tickle her hair across Moira’s neck. She smells like strawberries. “Please,” she adds, lower, “don’t tell anyone of this. Of me.”

 

There is nobody to tell, between Moira’s steady stream of field medic assignments and acquaintance-level camaraderie with a few lab technicians. And, with a frown, “But it’s fine for you to walk the corridors?”

 

Angela rolls her eyes,  _ scowls _ , like that fateful day in the Cambodian Jungle. “Just.” She pulls away now, and Moira almost misses the scent, sickly and sweet. “Meet me there. Oh-fourteen-hundred.” And then she is gone, retreating, and Moira watches her go once again.

 

* * *

 

 

The fourth time Moira watches Angela die, she is sitting in her lab at oh-fourteen-hundred hours, mind churning to understand what is underfolding before her.

 

Angela, with a scalpel, having just cut her wrists from the heel of the palm to her elbow. Her arms hung between her legs, red blood dripping down her hands, off her fingers, into the awaiting bucket below. Sitting at her desk, smiling somewhat, as if this made  _ this _ any easier to understand.

 

“How long does it take them to work?”

 

“Some injuries, minutes. Others -- like Cambodia -- hours. I’m trying to measure the response rate. Not in such a…” Sheepishly, she looks down at the meat of her arms, still leaking. Moira knows the quantity of blood in a human body; approximately five litres, with blood loss above thirty percent of the body-weight considered to be life threatening-- “... crude manner, usually. But I know you wouldn’t believe me otherwise.”

 

Blood has never bothered Moira, and neither has the reality of war. Field medicine  _ was _ her calling, she knew, but watching Angela die  _ again _ before her eyes. This re-awakened that same feeling from the first time she died; the interest tickling at her chest. Not just for Angela, but for what she had started, and what she was sharing with Moira, now.

 

“And you actually will,” Even just what Angela was  _ proposing _ was maddening, and to say it aloud. Well. “die?”

 

Angela shrugs, a feat. “Arguably. Like with the shrapnel injury, they usually put me into a catatonic state while they repair the damage. My heart slows. My brain activity is minimal.”

 

“And then you just....” She trails off, gesturing.

 

Angela picks up, “Wake up. A surprise for the morgue assistant two weeks ago, you can appreciate.” Angela smiles again, but it gives way to a sigh as she looks down at her wrists, still leaking steadily into the awaiting bucket. “It was unpleasant. Even more so, having to explain to the  _ Brass _ why I was still alive.”

 

Of course, the meeting earlier today. “I can imagine the questions have been non-stop.” Moira offers her a bit of a smile, too, then pulls up her chair closer. “Thank you, Angela, sincerely. For showing me this.  _ You _ . It’s truly remarkable.”

 

“I--” There’s the skittish animal again, the one they supposedly put down, in favor of the incredibly capable Doctor and Scientist. “thank you. Moira. I’m glad you think so.”

 

“And if I can help in any way,” Moira adds, “with the Brass, or with any research. Please, tell me. I’m fascinated, but also -- just plain fascinated with you. Seeing you fight through what you did in Cambodia, to still have  _ spoken _ to me. Well.” Angela is blushing, perhaps, which would be another feat with the amount of blood pooled in the bucket at her feet. “I haven’t stopped thinking about it.”

 

“Oh,” Angela squeaks, and that blush suddenly rushes from her cheeks, the same way her eyes disappear into the back of her head and she slumps forward bonelessly. Moira should have seen it coming, really, kept track of the one litre, two litres--

 

At least, she catches her before she gets a face-full of her own blood. Angela curls into the warmth of her neck, shivering, and a shushing noise escapes Moira’s lips. Moira extracts her carefully from her desk, dresses her wounds, lays her down in the closest cot, and waits.

 

* * *

 

 

The fifth time Moira watches Angela die is a time after, many months after the last, and it’s probably the worst one yet.

 

Now with two heads working together on the Nanites, exploring the possibilities, monitoring Angela’s health -- it goes quicker. Research develops into something  _ handheld _ and that’s the Vivifi, a needle canister which breeds and houses Nanities, to be injected into terminally wounded patients.

 

Angela received the blessing of their aid in the same way -- injection -- simply in a much larger dose. Theoretically, it should prevent any long-lasting effects, healing only in the short-term, and then the body fights off the last of the remaining foreign antibodies like it would any common virus.

 

In practice, well. Angela doesn’t let Moira even  _ consider _ injecting herself, let alone harming herself to do it in the first place. Test subjects, human or animal, are also out of the question.

 

“I started this project more to  _ understand _ them, Moira,” is the argument they’re having now, have had before, will have again, “not to wield them.”

 

“And we will  _ never _ understand them unless we expand our testing base,” is the rebuttal, constant and back and forth. “I’m here, I’m willing. I’m under the Brass, now, too, and we have  _ full _ authority. You can’t stop me.” 

 

Angela sighs painfully, and Moira knows she’s pinching the bridge of her nose between her thumb and forefinger. But with Moira’s back turned to her, Angela still implores, “ _ Moira _ . I love you. That’s too much to lose.” Moira’s shoulders pinch at the words, they always do, every time this argument comes around. “Me, when I made that choice? I had  _ nothing _ .” A hollow chuckle, and Moira clenches her teeth. “Stage four leukemia, aging and demented grandparents. My interest in science. That’s it. A last bid to save my life, a big fucking gamble, and it paid off. And for whatever reason it did, I’m using it to not let you give  _ your _ reason up.”

 

_ Ba-boom, ba-boom, ba-boom. _ Blissful silence, until Moira sighs wearily.

 

“I’m sorry,” breathes Angela, barely audible.

 

“No,” returns Moira, still with her eyes on the sequence in front of her, the thirtheith trial today, the one-thousand-and-twelfth trial since the research officially began, “ _ I’m _ sorry.”

 

And Angela is there, as always, wrapping her arms around Moira’s shoulders. Moira leans in, inhaling strawberry and  _ alive _ , with sorrow curling in her gut. Which starts eating at her tenfold when Angela freezes against her back, dead still.

 

“Oh my god,” she whispers, hot against Moira’s ear. “Oh my  _ god _ .”

 

“What--” But, of course, the sequence. It’s flashing for Moira’s attention in green and black:  _ FUSION SUCCESS. FUSION SUCCESS. FUSION SUCCESS. _

 

Both gaping, they turn to each other to gasp, “It works.”

 

Angela raves about theories, papers -- and Moira nods along, of course, but also knows  _ why _ it works. The extra string to the sequence, the drop of O-negative, pricked from Moira’s finger earlier that week. Not telling Angela seems…. cruel. But Angela has been trying for thirteen years, has never had Moira at her side, and Angela has been through enough already.

 

The Nanities needing a host was the only thing that ever made sense, ever  _ will _ make sense. They can’t reproduce asexually, they don’t multiply, they can’t be artificially created. Moira knew the moment their first samples died, and they had to extract more from Angela. 

 

But to actually test it, to go against Angela.

 

Moira  _ loves _ her. She does. But the research is fascinating, almost as much as the woman herself. Field medicine could only get her so far, and entertain her so much.

 

The Vivifi sits on their shared bench, Moira’s bench across from it. Hooking it up to the simulation is easy, but injecting it is harder. The device is clunky, nearly the size of a generic handbag, with a tiny needle to ensure no Nanites escape airborne.

 

_ Actually _ injecting it, however, is the worst of all. It’s hot, hotter than lifegivers should be. It’s burning, in fact, climbing in intensity as it travels down Moira’s arm, into her chest, down to her toes. It reaches her head, through the thick veins in her neck -- the jugulars, the superior vena cana -- and the rest fades to black.

 

The world comes back in grayscale. Whites, first, then greys, then the blacks. The color bleeds in later, weeks later, when Moira’s body finally fights off the violent infection and shuts down again, only with the intent to rest.

 

Watching Angela slowly crumble at her bedside is probably the worst death of all.

 

* * *

 

 

The sixth time Moira watches  _ someone _ die, it’s not Angela, and it’s not even a some _ one _ but a some _ thing _ . A rabbit, a white one called Cosmo, and it’s in her individual lab in the South wing.

 

Then it’s Snowball, Mira, Napoleon, Hunter, Javier. The list goes on, rabbits with stupid names, maybe that so Moira doesn’t feel so bad. About them. 

 

About Angela.

 

She visits occasionally. There are few words: passing of research, documenting Moira’s vitals. Moira catches the fleeting glances every so often, when Angela thinks she isn’t watching. But she always is, always  _ has _ been, since that first moment in the Jungle in Cambodia. The meeting in that hallway, destined.

 

This research. Destined for, evidently, much greater things than their relationship.

 

The next rabbit is called Clemence.

 

* * *

 

 

The seventh time Moira watches someone die, it’s still not Angela, but it’s some _ one _ . Gabriel Reyes is hesitant, but Moira’s already got him into the room, which is the hardest part.

 

“Sixteen trial runs on myself were successful,” she tells him, as he takes a seat. “I showed you the extent of my abilities already. But if you would like a second demonstration, for your confidence--”

 

“Not my confidence,” answers Gabriel, cutting her clean off. He looks harrowed, desperate. Even more so than their first meeting with his kid and the ninja. “You’re sure it will produce positive effects? What you sent me; the Nanites seem to evolve differently from individual to individual. The first subject you studied developed immortality. You became a conduit.”

 

“I’m sorry, Gabriel, but we won’t know until after the treatment.”

 

He sighs, and suddenly Moira’s thrown back to the hallway between the East and West Wing two years ago. Watching Angela, trapped in a corner, decide whether to trust Moira or not.

 

“Gabriel,” she says gently, at his silence, moving to perch on adjacent chair. “I know this is a hard choice. But if you think it is your  _ only _ choice, then perhaps, it is best to take the leap.” He looks at her, the cogs visibly working in his mind. “You told me of your concerns. I share them.  _ I _ think this is the best way. And I am in it with you.”

 

He nods, just once, but won’t meet her eyes. He says, instead, “I’m never gonna be able to explain this to the kid. The others, maybe. But.” His eyes fall closed, and Moira lets him have his moment. Dwelling on thoughts at times like this; she knew all too well. “But I hope he’ll understand, one day.”

 

“He’ll understand you did it  _ for _ him. To protect him.”

 

“I hope so.”

 

Moira sets her hand on his, and he gives her an slightly convincing smile in return. And then: it is time. The Vivifi is much more developed with Moira’s sole attention, but she sees Gabriel’s facade falter when she pulls it from its case, onto the counter for preparation.

 

Yet, he says nothing.

 

Even to, “How do you feel?” when the machine stops whirring, and Moira tries to avoid teetering -- literally -- on the edge of her seat. He  _ does _ meet her gaze, but instead, fades into smoke before her very eyes.

 

* * *

 

 

Eventually, Moira loses count. Gabriel does, too, the more the treatment progresses. She lets herself wonder if it’s the only thing he’s lost count of, but he never brings it up, so she never asks.

 

* * *

 

 

One thousand, two hundred and forty seven.  _ Ba-boom _ ,  _ ba-boom. _ The news report keeps repeating the number, over and over, or maybe it’s the overtime of Moira’s mind churning to understand.

 

  1. _1247_. Moira writes it all down on paper, all old-fashioned, because anything else would be too complicated. Too exciting. Too--



 

_ Ba-boom. Ba-boom _ .

 

Technically, it was one thousand, two hundred and forty  _ six _ . One less. Because. Angela Ziegler can’t die, not really. Yet, she wonders if it’s the first death she’s had since Moira started on this path of no return, deep into the depths of conspiracy and illegal science. 

 

_ Ba-boom, ba-boom _ .

 

“The final death toll for the Zürich disaster is--”

 

She hopes it is the last death Angela will have to face. She would wish her that small mercy, above anything.

**Author's Note:**

> "You were there for me when I was falling apart  
> And I let you down, it left a mark on your heart  
> I'll never let go again, I'll never let go again  
> I'll never let go again  
> You got healing hands"  
> [HEALING HANDS - Conrad Sewell](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=6PHFQTR-Hn4)
> 
> thanks for reading! i hope you enjoyed <3


End file.
